20 Best Watercolor Paints For Professionals (2023 Updated)

It has a really good quality in a nice and small portable box. The colors are natural, basically the most important colors. Some of them are not basic, like Chinese White or Ivory Black, but black is good for black and white exercises playing around with lights and shadows, and white is good for creating opaque colors sometimes.

The half pans are good as you can try out lots of colors in a small box that you can easily carry with you, but you need to buy 1 more half pan for each row or fill it up somehow with a sponge. etc, otherwise they’re moving/fall outd while painting which is a little bothering.

The half pans are also really small, so will be used away faster. Briefly I’m really happy with it, it’s a perfect start for beginners and professionals equally. Winsor & Newton is a good quality.

We all think of the half pan paintbox when we think of watercolour painting but sooner or later we begin to realize that tubes offer a thicker, more bold coverage of colour and this paintbox holds twelve tubes of Winsor and Newton Watercolour paint.

The quality is good and the design practical. I just wish Winsor and Newton would stop putting white in their paintboxes unless they made it gouache instead.

These are beautifully paints with great course payoff and the majority are single pigment paints too. Winsor and Newton is the classic watercolour brand and I, like many, learnt to paint with the student Cotman version.

I’m so happy to add this paint to my collection and I know it will get plenty of use and the price was brilliant, so very happy, thank you.

I love the Kuretake Gansai paints for their opacity and use them in mixed media as well as other watercolor uses such as making cards or when I want vivid colors! I bought the set of 48 and typically I use Daniel Smith’s or Holbein or Sennelier paints for watercolor, but these paints definitely have their place in my arsenal of art supplies.

I especially recommend them to someone starting out in watercolors when you don’t want to spend the $$ on Daniel Smith and other brands necessarily quite yet. I would recommend them for any artist to use and especially love Blick’s customer service and availability of their products!.

From its elegant box, to its marvelous palette of colors, this is the box of every aspiring watercolorist’s dream. I am just getting back into watercolors after a long absence, and opening this 48 pan set just got me so excited to get started! The colors are just drop-dead gorgeous; large, generous pans of colors, including some colors that you wouldn’t normally see in a watercolor set.

Yes, it’s a little pricey, but for those who can afford it it’s a wonderful indulgence. It’s actually about $10-$20 cheaper than the Gansai sets on other websites. The colors are described as opaque, but have marvelous flexibility in terms of being thinned to transparency without losing any of their vibrancy.

I am very happy with my purchase and would recommend.

Amazing quality for a non artist grade set. The pans rewet amazingly fast and the color is rich and juicy and vibrant. The color choice is great, with warmer and cooler primaries and a set of secondaries and a brown, it is extremely versatile.

Not a perfect split complementary palette but close enough that it works. They mix so nicely together and dont muddy up as quickly as i would have thought for non single pigment paints. No pigment codes were provided but i was able to find them online, after some search.

Two greens are extremely similar but i can forgive that because of all the positives this set has. It is amazing quality for the price and it is quickly becoming a favorite of mine. I cant stop reaching for it when i go to paint.

I have not received this item from Walmart yet, but I have already had the item from another source so am excited to get these at this price as I paid more from the other source. These watercolors are worth the price just for the pan palette they come in which I have purchased empty for more than the price of this pan filled with paints.

The half pans are removable and if you are an artist that fills their own half pans with preferred tube paints this makes for an excellent travel palette that can be changed at will. Also, if you push the pans over all the way, there is room to add a 7th pan in each row as well as more pans down the middle row where a brush could be placed.

This means this palette has the capability of holding not just 12 half pans, but 21. The colors are vivid, fun, and for beginning and advanced artists working in watercolor. Thank you Walmart for the lower price.

Lower than other have these paints unless caught on a sale. If you are a person that loves to work in watercolor, these are definitely worth trying. Just beware there are other palettes with different color schemes and you will want them all.

Pretty colors, the tin opens, closes fine. It arrived in a short time frame. I have 3 of the other tins, mainly based on customer reviews. They are easy to take along on trips. I like the paper enclosed to paint a sample of each color, to help in determining if you want it right out of the pan or if you want to mix it with another.

This tin has the # of the color plus a name for it. The Classics, Tropicals, and Decadent Pies sets only have a number to identify them. I like the finger ring at the bottom of the tin if you are holding the tin as it gives good control.

I do put a rubber band around each tin when not being used, safety precaution—-all of mine have closed really well, but I am one of those who do it “just in case”. I enjoy these watercolors. I am not an artiest, just love the hobby.

I’m relatively new to watercolor painting, so I haven’t tried a ton of different brands. But after buying a cheap set of Sakura Koi watercolors, I gave them away and went straight for Holbein. Since then I’ve discovered Daniel Smith, which I also love, but you can’t go wrong with either brand.

Now if I could just buy some talent and experience. #sweepstakes.

FineTec micas are preferred for a reason. Easy to obtain opacity with watercolor, dense mica creates luminescent shimmer. This is what I was looking for. It is especially beautiful on Stonehenge Aqua Cold press Black Heavy watercolor block.

I spend a lot of time watching artists test various metallics and reading reviews. I’m glad I saved for this set. Worth the money!.

I am truly impressed with the quality of these products. I’ve tried many others and will continue to, but I’m taking a good hard look at Castle Arts. These are not “good for the money”, these are just excellent! The piece I’ve included is my first test with colored pencils, watercolor and gouache, all from Castle.

These are going to be repeat purchases to restock as well as gifts.

I can’t give an authentic opinion because it’s going to be a Christmas present off my lovely Grandaughter. I’m enjoying encouraging her to enjoy art. She will be excited to see me open my Christmas present off her! We will not let on I knew about it.

My paints are taking quite a beating at the moment because she is fascinated how water colour makes it’s own picture as it travels across paper. Consequently I’m going to need to replenish them. I’m sure they will be fine.

This is basically beef gelatin. And like gelatin you have to be careful how you disolve it. It disolves easily in hot liquid, like coffee. or making a hot broth. But in cold liquid it’s tricky. I make a protein shake with a banana, milk and a little nutmeg in a blender.

Put in a thinly sliced banana, a tablespoon of the gelatin, add some milk to cover, then another tablespoon of gelatin, then the rest of the milk. In other words, layer the gelatin and don’t put all of it in at once.

Blend on high for 20-30 seconds. If you see gelatin sticking to the side of the container, stop blending and scrape it back into the liquid with a tablespoon. Then continue blending until disolved. The more gelatin, the frothier the shake.

I’ve never used more than 2 tablespoons.

I only say “really nice” because I haven’t tried enough other brands to make a fair comparison – these are delightful to work with! Beautiful colors that mix and blend smoothly with bright, beautiful pigments.

The tin is slender and solid, portable while still being sturdy and large enough to tuck a few brushes in for convenience, and it’s perhaps a little too comfortable to balance using the integrated ring (I have a very interesting stripe of sunburn from outer elbow to inner wrist after forgetting to put on sunscreen before painting in the back garden.

) Also it works out to an average of about $3. 45/half pan. I really can’t argue with that value. My one quibble with it is that I don’t see an immense value/shade difference between phtalo and cinereous blue and would have preferred to swap one for a different shade of green (why don’t they make a normal half-pan of the pretty sap green they put in the Aqua Mini set?), but there’s plenty of space in the palette to add a few more half-pans.

A nice set of colors, though the “extras” are kind of a head-scratch. Why black? No one uses that in watercolor yet it is in every set. And where is the yellow ochre color? And no warm yellow like New Gamboge or Indian Yellow.

But they did include “Cinereous Blue” which is Sennelier’s answer to Cerulean (white mixed with Phthalo Blue GS) and one of their famous colors. It’s a tamer phthalo blue and a nice shade for landscapes.

Transparent colors, good set.

I love watercolor dot cards! Dot cards enable you to try out every single color of a water color brand before spending a gazillion dollars on a tube of paint that might not work for what you are creating.

The purpose of a dot card is to give you a sample of each paint color for reference, but I know people who have painted actually using these dots. Whats also nice about these dot cards is it gives you the transparency, lightfastness, granulation and staining information for each color at a glance.

Which is super helpful when youre designing your next masterpiece! The Schmincke dot cards give you a generous amount to sample from.

While this was old stock, watercolor paints never age. The colors are still viable and fresh. I had a tiny bit difficulty removing the paper wrapping on three of them but with gentle perseverance it came off.

The palette/tin they came in was not even worth keeping for scrap, but I knew this would be the case from reading reviews, so I put them in a palette from an extra set of Prima’s I had. The colors are Beautiful and I can’t wait to use them for a nice painting.

Am on the hunt for a new set now with different colors to add to my collection.

Schmincke paints are among the best in the world. This little travel set is a perfect combination of pigments and convenience. The flask holds water and the small cup hooks into to the palette nicely.

The price was exceptional for this palette.

Highly pigmented colors, requires diluting with a lot of water to achieve muted colors on paper. Some additional positives: the plastic palette lies flat when open; the diluted paint does not ‘bead up’ in the mixing wells, but stays where you put it, not always the case with plastic palettes; the travel brush (~meh~ I’ll use it if I forget to bring other brushes) has a nib on the end which allows you to pull out the mixing tray for cleaning, and allows you to easily pull out the half pans.

Overall great travel palette as back up to my old W&N one.

I can easily say the Van Gogh range is very much pushing at professional quality but with much lower prices. The nature colour palette is excellent for landscapes, possibly it could include a blue for even more green shade possibilities but it will be hard to find better quality at this price.

The box is neat but has a 6 pan mixing tray which is also removable to enable further mixing in the lid.

These are my favourite watercolors. I would recommend trying a few colors out before forming an opinion. The way the pigment reacts on the paper varies widely between pigments despite being from the same brand and model.

The sepia 2b is a great one. It forms a nice flat stain that varies slightly from blue to green and yellow. It also has a wide dynamic range. I usually use one or two drops of paint mixed with water to cover a 9×9″ piece of paper.

If you’ve done any research on this product you already know it is super awesome and will be proven time and again. Don’t hesitate to try at least your favourite color, you’ll be hooked. The deal on all sets is fantastic and I haven’t seen it offered anywhere else, so I am absolutely happy.

My only problem at first was getting that color to water ratio right so the colors do not appear full strength, they were too much, you see. Why was it a problem? Because I never encountered it with any other color before (unfortunately).

But hey, I got the hang of it pretty quickly. If you are into painting florals mostly, you can get away with just sets 1 & 2, some gorgeous pinks in there and enough other colors to compliment them. Even if you are not into florals, those 2 sets are good base sets on their own or can form a totally solid base set together.

Set 3 or C has a couple of colors I like a lot, but mostly I see it as complimentary set, not main. Set 4, or D, has some neon-ish colors, sort of like highlighters, which is quite rare in watercolors, although not as bright as neon acrylics, of course.

So looking forward to playing with set D. PS. I love-love-love how the colors are numbered as well as named, that makes it so easy to store and organize and find. I made a chart with cells from 1 to 56 and organized them accordingly in my drawer, 10 per row.

Now even though I only see the pipette top when I open the drawer thanks to my numbered chart I can instantly get the color I need, looking up its number from the chart.

I am a beginner when it comes to watercolor but as I’ve learned in other art forms sometimes you get what you don’t pay for. I started with inexpensive paints and slowly worked my way up to great paints.

It makes such a difference to work with Dr Martin’s high quality liquid formulas. The colors are vibrant and true. So little product is required to make beautiful art pieces. I only wished the shipping was quicker.

The colors are vibrant, and a little goes a very long way. I love the way they’ve organized the color palettes, too. For plein air artists, these little tins are just wonderful. Add a couple pre-filled waterbrushes, and a couple of paper towels, and you’re good for the whole day, and it all fits in your pocket.

Just add a watercolor or mixed mediia notebook, a light graphic pencil and a waterproof fineliner, and you can be out urban sketching in no time at all. The half-pans can be swapped out, or you can add two or three full pans, and augment what they’ve given you with the pre-made palette.

This is my third Confections watercolor set and I am IN LOVE!! The colors are vibrant and beautiful and I adore the size of the tin. The twelve specific, Confections palettes are innovative and lovely.

I had a hard time deciding which ones I wanted most and I’m sure I’ll be spoiling myself with more sets in the future. They’re great!.

I love these Prima/Art Philosophy half pan sets! The color is deeply pigmented and the box alone is worth the money. I have 4 sets now and love them all. It comes with a color swatch card so that you can have an example of the color right in the box.

The pans can be re-filled with tube color when you run out.

I like to buy this size of snazaroo – white face paint compared to the larger size for most face painting events. it covers well. As an artist I believe that the quality of the product contributes greatly to the quality of the work, this is why I am an avid user of Snazaroo.

Their quality face paints make application smooth and easy with just a little water. The colors are bright and long-lasting with little to no caking and, once dry, do not easily smudge. The removal is made just as simple, using water and a paper towel it comes of easily and leaves no skin staining.

Snazaroo is quality face paint I know I can trust with their non-toxic and allergen free ingredients to put on any skin type. I use Snazaroo at home on my kids and professionally at art festivals.

These are excellent watercolours and so affordable! Fantastic that they are available individually to make up your own pallets. I’ve also bought some of the artist quality WN tubes just to compare, but frankly I don’t see any difference between the two.

Then again, I use them for messy mixed media, so the more expensive paints would be wasted on me anyway. They are also handy to add to your orders when you just want to make up the difference for free delivery! I’ll be back for more, I expect.

I’m addicted to watercolours at the moment!.

I usually buy W&N professional watercolors. The Watercolorist’s Essential Notebook book by Gordon MacKenzie says that specifically Cotman cobalt blue has excellent quality pigment and can be a substitute for professional watercolor tubes.

MacKenzie has a chart with the quality of pigments from each brand and color so I use that to decide which to purchase. I have not had any problems with it so far.

I was running low on several colors, and decided to give the Blick brand a try. I don’t know why I never purchased them before. Compared to the well known artist quality brands, they are better, the same, or not quite as good, depending on the particular color of the particular brand and personal preference.

And the price for Blick Artists WC is far lower than any of the well known artist brands. Compared to the better student brands, they are better than Grumbacher Academy and far better than W&N Cotman, yet they are much less expensive per ml than either of those two.

My paintings are better because I am not so concerned about conserving precious paint, or making a mistake and “wasting” the paint. A 14 ml tube holds a LOT of paint. Beautiful, rich, luscious, smooth paint.

For the intermediate watercolorists out there, who might be wondering whether they should make the leap from inexpensive beginner sets or student quality paints to artist/professional quality paint, give Blick WC a try.

As mentioned above, they are a better value per ml than the student quality paints. And even though the really inexpensive brands are cheaper per ml than Blick WC, they are not necessarily cheaper per painting, because a little of high-quality paint goes much farther.

Just prior to placing my order for Blick WC, I bought a few tubes of W&N artist and Grumbacher artist locally because I was in a hurry for a few colors. Now I wish I had just waited and ordered them all from Blick.

I’m also having a hard time resisting the temptation to purchase tubes of colors I still have a lot of in other brands. Thanks to Blick for their great service and for being committed to developing and offering artist quality materials that are affordable.

I have enjoyed my blick watercolors, and because they are my first artist grade paints I have nothing to compare them to, but definitely more vibrant than my former student paints. However, the cerulean blue is unusable.

It is clumpy and chalky and does not spread in a wash. I called to get a replacement, and they sent me another, equally unusable. I’ll be trying a different brand for this pigment. Cerulean is supposed to be the classic sky wash color.

All I get is lumps of chalky color.

These are very good watercolors. The pigments are strong and their performance on paper is just awesome. The price for them is so low that I expected them to be less than good. Boy, was I surprised. I am on a fixed income and if it weren’t for Blick I would have had to find another hobby.

Thank you so very much.

This is a brilliant set of paints. It is huge and will last me a long time, so whilst it is a lot of money I think it is terrific value for money. I have never used Sennelier paints before and they are beautiful.

Highly recommend.

I love, love, love Kuretake Gansai watercolors! Ths indigo is one of THE BEST indigos I have (and I have that color from many, many brands – it’s my favorite color). You get a near gouache level of opaqueness.

All of their watercolors have rich, beautiful color and spread on the page nicely. Their gold is also a solid choice if you want some glitz.

I love all the Gansai Tambi Watercolors. This one is a warm earthy yellow! I love how Jetpens sent these watercolor pans so well packaged that they arrived in pristine condition. This was also the ONLY place where I could find single colors.

I received a painting book, box of paints and brushes from my daughter at Christmas. I love painting the pictures but have got through the white paint quite quickly. The paints are excellent quality and I will definitely buy more colours next time.